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Conversation, Cocktails and Community Cinema February 22, 2011

Last Tuesday, we tried something new by bringing people together at Liberty Bar to watch the inspiring movie, Taking Root: The Vision of Wangari Maathai. Wangari Maathai won the Nobel Peace prize in 2004 for eliciting massive social and political change in Kenya. While this was no small undertaking, her vision started with the simple act of teaching women in her community to plant trees in order to counteract the effects of colonial deforestation.

The documentary, supplied to us by the Emmy-award winning PBS series Independent Lens, took us through the stages of her peaceful fight, from its humble beginnings as the Green Belt Movement to its triumphant end with a democratically elected president of Kenya.

To say this movie was inspiring might be an understatement. It emphasized the power of grassroots movements to change the world, and allowed us all to recognize how we’re changing the world every day in our own ways.

After the movie, we had a thoughtful discussion about the issues brought up in the film. We talked about the importance of changing our economic perspective when it comes to environmental loss as well as the value of education as an impetus for change. One participant tied the movie to the book Confessions of an Economic Hitman, which led us to another great idea …

Would you be interested in reading this book (or some other!) and getting together with a group of people to discuss it? We want to inspire dialogue in our community, but are dedicated to doing that in a way that meets your needs and desires. Our Community Cinema event proved that having a movie to react to gets people talking. Have ideas to get the gabfest going? Tell us: jan@seattleworks.org

Photo by Wanjira Mathai

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